Under a blood red sky
A metaphor
A cliché
I cannot resist
Blood red it is
And so too
This life journey
Heart broken
Love rent
By the loss of one
Under a blood red sky
A metaphor
A cliché
I cannot resist
Blood red it is
And so too
This life journey
Heart broken
Love rent
By the loss of one
As sea falls back into sea
Prepares for a new assault on the shore
Its hardened rock
Broken but not brittle
Recalcitrant
Beneath the bruised sky
Of abuses relentless
I am reminded
Of the survivors
I came for the storms
For the thrash and hiss
Of the sea upon the rock
The immovable
Resisting the unstoppable
And it is
In a manner
Difficult to describe
So utterly beautiful
And moving
But I wish
In this moment
Only for the peace
Of a clear sky
And an ocean
Becalmed
Swaddled in silky cloud
Upon a bed of supple grasses and pine
Earth
Cradle of my being
It was the last full day in India. The smoke had been chokingly thick for the entire month I’d spent in the north, and Delhi hadn’t even been the worst of it. Still, I’d found a decent rate at a decent hotel (some small comfort in exchange for the respiratory distress) on the edge of Old Delhi’s fantastical Chandni Chowk markets for the final days before my flight home.
These leaves may seem
Like a reminder of past glory
These leaves may seem
Like a reminder of future possibility
But the leaves
Are just leaves
All the rest is just stories
I tell myself to make sense
Not of leaves
But of my own existence
angry sea
angry sky
in between
the boughs all fly
tree trunks bow
wind tests their roots
and salts the air
with whitecaps flare
so here am I
lens held to chest
braced to keep
a steady frame
while all around
the chaos roars
a shutter click
renders it tame
rain falls
pittering the leaves
pattering the earth
nature’s sutra
gently chanted
outside my window
inside
warm
and calm
quiet mind
full heart
present in the moment
life finds a way
in the most inhospitable
conditions
places
times
to
survive
thrive
flourish
so too
can I
Geometries of Euclidean beings
Dominate the irregular perfections
Of organic patterns
And I
A lover of both
Math and nature
Am left unsure
Which is
The greater beauty
Is such judgment
Even necessary
Or wise
After all
Beauty itself
Is the construct
Of an eye
And a mind
Who am I to say
What you should find
Beautiful